University complaints

[mk45]

My son recently completed a dissertation with a well known Midlands university but got a lower mark than expected. My son took his dissertation without any support or teaching from the course leader. The course leader has emailed my son to confirm he had no contact with my son. He said lockdown was hard for students and staff. This person was also his dissertation supervisor and he did not mark the draft dissertation so my son took the whole two module course without being taught. He had informed them he could not access course materials early on. He raised it three times throughout the course but staff did not follow their own complaints procedure and now the course is finished they want him to put it on a step 1 form. Is this usual for students trying to complete degrees and dissertations during lockdown? I know my son can complete the internal complaints procedure but has anyone experienced this process because his close friend, another student from the same university, recently committed suicide and it might be better to leave it rather than deal with a stressful complaints procedure that won't achieve much. Thanks

That would be over twice the work for the lecturer.

How’s your son doing after his friend’s death, OP? And when did that happen? (I’m not clear on where this falls into the rest of the timeline, which I can see you’ve already been through in some detail with PP, so I’m sorry if I’ve missed anything.) I should imagine he was quite traumatised by this event yet, from what you’ve said, it seems your son only applied for a two week extension on the dissertation which seems very little by way of special circumstances recognition. Do you know if he spoke to a personal tutor or similar (this would not have been the dissertation supervisor but someone given specific oversight of his individual academic and pastoral care)? Or did he perhaps talk to the university’s counselling or mental health support services? I’m just wondering if part of the problem here may be that he was struggling emotionally and not getting adequate support. That might help to explain his apparent fogginess about details and lack of engagement — it’s really not uncommon for me to find that students who have dropped off the map a bit are having mental health issues or family problems. What’s frustrating in these situations is that by the time these extenuating circumstances have come to my attention, often after much chasing if the student, the opportunity to help has been partly lost. If you and your son feel this may be the case, and that he should have sought more help at the time, you may still have options via an appeal regarding recognition of special circumstances. Whether that’s the case depends on this university’s regulations (both normally and under COVID regs — there may be significant differences). Should you wish to try to go down this route your son should in the first instance seek advice from the pastoral lead for his department. This person is usually referred to as something like Department Tutor or Senior Tutor. It should be obvious on the website but the student/department/faculty office should be able to provide the info if not.
Finally, whatever happens, please try not to view this as a life changing disaster for your son. What he does next matters much more than what’s just happened. If he doesn’t yet have any ideas for next steps in life now’s the time to develop them: get him looking forward and excited for the future and this dissertation will feel less significant, whatever happens with it. And honestly, it won’t mean anything’s out of reach that wouldn’t have been otherwise. Not in the long or even medium term.

@Datingandnoideahowto

So where did he get that from? That info about where to upload and by when - where did he get that from?

I found it on the website. It is still on the website but it doesn't show any updates due to covid. Maybe universities didn't have to update course information when changes were made?

So you don’t even know if he read that.

You need to step back he’s 21 or 22. This is for him to navigate (in the absence of SN. I’ve asked two or three times about that but you’ve not answered.)

There is a difference between ‘the supervisor had no contact’ and ‘there were no opportunities for DS to contact the supervisor’.

At the end of the day, a dissertation isn’t about meeting the course requirements. It’s about producing an original and novel piece of work - in other disciplines it would be about conducting your own piece of research, something completely new. It’s the pinnacle of the students’ course.

You haven’t mentioned what mark your DS got, but you don’t seem to imply he failed. He admitted himself that he didn’t put as much effort in as he could have on the synopsis. If you ask yourself honestly, do you think the work he put in deserves a higher grade? Not the hours put in, not based on what he’s got in other modules, but did he really put in the level of work to achieve a high grade dissertation? Reading around the subject, researching, bringing in different elements of things he has learnt. The lack of push on his part to resolve the issues (3 emails for something he can’t access doesn’t seem a huge amount) makes me wonder how he approached the dissertation.

That said, to some extent posters (including me) have largely ignored your actual question.

I assume a step 1 form is the first part of lodging a complaint. If he’s asked to make a complaint I assume that would therefore be the logical next step.

A complaint is unlikely to lead to his grade being raised based purely on the complaint being upheld. An appeal is more likely to do that. The university should have the process clearly laid out in policies and protocols (May be called a code of practice) on their website which should lay out the steps and the possible outcomes.

@RoseAndGeranium

How’s your son doing after his friend’s death, OP? And when did that happen? (I’m not clear on where this falls into the rest of the timeline, which I can see you’ve already been through in some detail with PP, so I’m sorry if I’ve missed anything.) I should imagine he was quite traumatised by this event yet, from what you’ve said, it seems your son only applied for a two week extension on the dissertation which seems very little by way of special circumstances recognition. Do you know if he spoke to a personal tutor or similar (this would not have been the dissertation supervisor but someone given specific oversight of his individual academic and pastoral care)? Or did he perhaps talk to the university’s counselling or mental health support services? I’m just wondering if part of the problem here may be that he was struggling emotionally and not getting adequate support. That might help to explain his apparent fogginess about details and lack of engagement — it’s really not uncommon for me to find that students who have dropped off the map a bit are having mental health issues or family problems. What’s frustrating in these situations is that by the time these extenuating circumstances have come to my attention, often after much chasing if the student, the opportunity to help has been partly lost. If you and your son feel this may be the case, and that he should have sought more help at the time, you may still have options via an appeal regarding recognition of special circumstances. Whether that’s the case depends on this university’s regulations (both normally and under COVID regs — there may be significant differences). Should you wish to try to go down this route your son should in the first instance seek advice from the pastoral lead for his department. This person is usually referred to as something like Department Tutor or Senior Tutor. It should be obvious on the website but the student/department/faculty office should be able to provide the info if not. Finally, whatever happens, please try not to view this as a life changing disaster for your son. What he does next matters much more than what’s just happened. If he doesn’t yet have any ideas for next steps in life now’s the time to develop them: get him looking forward and excited for the future and this dissertation will feel less significant, whatever happens with it. And honestly, it won’t mean anything’s out of reach that wouldn’t have been otherwise. Not in the long or even medium term.

His gp called an ambulance. He was very stressed and anxious. I think the university had a blanket two week extenuating circumstances policy and it looks like students didn't have to inform them why. I saw an email from a university member of staff suggesting ways he could get help so they were aware. He tried to get help from the tutor when he got his result but she could only meet on one day as she was on holiday the next. My son was isolating on that one day as he had been pinged on the app.

But he should’ve been engaging all year not just after he got his result.

Sorry, I didn't answer. This was in December. I drove up and brought him home for a while. He went back before the lockdown was announced. We didn't know he would have to stay there at the time. It is a two hour drive and my job means I am at risk of coming in contact with covid regularly.

@Datingandnoideahowto

But he should’ve been engaging all year not just after he got his result.

Why do you think he wasn't engaging all year? He met all the deadlines. He fulfilled all the requirements. He had no problems with his other modules.

Because he only talked to the tutor after he got his result? He should have been proactive all year.

Right, so under these circumstances I’d have encouraged any student of mine to lodge an application for recognition of special circumstances that would have gone well beyond the blanket 2 week extension option. What the outcome of that application would have been depends, again, on the university’s policies. Most likely is that he would have been offered more time to do the work (often over the summer, for instance) which might also have meant time to get feedback on his draft. (The rules about whether feedback is still permitted/required can vary depending on the length of the extension). Sometimes it’s possible to request that the weighting of the affected piece of work is reduced, and in situations where a piece of work has clearly been adversely affected students may be offered a re-sit. Usually the application would need to be lodged by a deadline before marks release, but there is likely an appeals process which would permit your son to lodge an application retrospectively if he is able to show that he was not in a frame of mind that allowed him to do so or to recognise the need to do so at an earlier point. The fact that he has evidence that he was struggling emotionally at the time would weigh in his favour here. Whether he’d want to go through this process is another question entirely, but I suspect it is his best option if the outcome he’s looking for is a chance to improve on his mark. I’m not suggesting this as a way of gaming the system, to be clear, and it doesn’t sound to me as though your son is the kind of person who would try to do that anyway. But universities have procedures for mitigation where a student’s circumstances have adversely affected his or her performance for the sake of fairness, and it sounds to me as though your son went through an awful lot and would have benefited from the breathing and thinking space that a special circumstances recognition process could have provided. Nothing wrong with him looking into whether that may still be an option.

He had no problems with his other modules.

He was able to access class content fine for them? No Internet difficulties.

I'm still not getting it.

If he did fine in all his modules, then he is surely ok overall? Is there a need to pursue this?

@EduCated

There is a difference between ‘the supervisor had no contact’ and ‘there were no opportunities for DS to contact the supervisor’.

At the end of the day, a dissertation isn’t about meeting the course requirements. It’s about producing an original and novel piece of work - in other disciplines it would be about conducting your own piece of research, something completely new. It’s the pinnacle of the students’ course.

You haven’t mentioned what mark your DS got, but you don’t seem to imply he failed. He admitted himself that he didn’t put as much effort in as he could have on the synopsis. If you ask yourself honestly, do you think the work he put in deserves a higher grade? Not the hours put in, not based on what he’s got in other modules, but did he really put in the level of work to achieve a high grade dissertation? Reading around the subject, researching, bringing in different elements of things he has learnt. The lack of push on his part to resolve the issues (3 emails for something he can’t access doesn’t seem a huge amount) makes me wonder how he approached the dissertation.

That said, to some extent posters (including me) have largely ignored your actual question.

I assume a step 1 form is the first part of lodging a complaint. If he’s asked to make a complaint I assume that would therefore be the logical next step.

A complaint is unlikely to lead to his grade being raised based purely on the complaint being upheld. An appeal is more likely to do that. The university should have the process clearly laid out in policies and protocols (May be called a code of practice) on their website which should lay out the steps and the possible outcomes.

He left year 2 with a high 2.1 and he got a low 2.2 for this module but it was a double module. It brought his overall grade down to a 2.2. My understanding is that it is difficult to appeal grades as it is academic judgement. In the complaints procedure it seems to state the student has to request the outcome they require. I will read through it again.

That’s not unusual, level 6 is a very different level of critical thinking from level 5 and sometimes students struggle with it

@Datingandnoideahowto

So you don’t even know if he read that.

You need to step back he’s 21 or 22. This is for him to navigate (in the absence of SN. I’ve asked two or three times about that but you’ve not answered.)

What does SN mean?

Special needs.

SN = special needs (sometimes written as SEN)

For what it’s worth, I think some posters are being a little harsh. I can see why — it’s incredibly frustrating when students fail to engage and then try to blame lecturers who often don’t have time to chase every no-show. (This was particularly a problem with online teaching, I think.) But dealing with a peer’s suicide whilst living more or less in isolation for months is no bloody picnic, and I’m sad to think that your son went through all that, perhaps without acknowledging or recognising that he needed more support.

@RoseAndGeranium

For what it’s worth, I think some posters are being a little harsh. I can see why — it’s incredibly frustrating when students fail to engage and then try to blame lecturers who often don’t have time to chase every no-show. (This was particularly a problem with online teaching, I think.) But dealing with a peer’s suicide whilst living more or less in isolation for months is no bloody picnic, and I’m sad to think that your son went through all that, perhaps without acknowledging or recognising that he needed more support.

That's a valid post Rose well-put.

As ineedsun says, it’s not massively unusual for grades to drop in that way, some people find the step to dissertation difficult, even without everything your DS was dealing with in the midst of this, and he perhaps wasn’t entirely on track prior to this (from your comments about his efforts on the synopsis).

I think you need to go in eyes open that a complaint is unlikely to raise his grade. An appeal is perhaps more likely to achieve that.

Has he been in contact with his Students Union? They will have an advice team who will be experienced in the process, as well as the appeals process, and will be able to talk him through it and what to expect, both in terms of the process itself and likely outcomes.

@Datingandnoideahowto

You said he didn’t know he had a supervisor. The document clearly says he should have had one. So it’s on him to chase what the scoop was with that.

Did he do that? All year? From week one or when he realised he hadn’t been allocated a supervisor?

I think you are right and we need to find out if the other students knew they had a supervisor and how they were informed. It would be interesting to know if they had feedback during the course. He honestly didn't know he had a supervisor. He phoned me really distressed when he got the result and I asked him who is supervisor was. He had the friend's suicide, his own illness, a grandfather who had major heart surgery, a father stuck working overseas, a grandmother diagnosed with cancer and a mother working with covid patients. I personally think the course leader should have done more.

But if the course leader didn’t know that because he wasn’t communicating with them, how were they supposed to do anything?

@EarringsandLipstick

SN = special needs (sometimes written as SEN)

No he has a long term health condition.

This isn’t school, students are expected to be more self sufficient and seek support if needed. There is no way they would have known all this information if your son didn’t tell them. Sounds like the information was available for everyone but your son didn’t know about it / didn’t look. You still haven’t answered whether your son is neurodiverse or has SEND, that is the only reason I can think of for not picking up on all this stuff. Even if he is, the expectation is that he needs to seek out support himself. There are often 10s of thousands of students in a university and hundreds on one course, with multiple cohorts, there is a lot of support available but students need to be proactive

Cross posted with my comment that you hadn’t answered whether he has SEND